“Going by the evening train, I got an awful scare that my only companion in the carriage – an elderly bearded man – was going to drug me as he had a large bag and the carriage smelt strong of chloroform. After a few words of conversation I felt happier and though I kept an eye on him from behind my newspaper for some time, I finally concluded he was harmless (no doubt a doctor who had been at an operation) and shared my sandwiches with him.” (Beatrix Waterford, March 1904)
The recently published memoirs of Beatrix Waterford (nee Petty-Fitzmaurice), wife of Henry Beresford, the 6th Marquis of Waterford (1875-1911) represent an affectionate, warm and welcome addition to the written history of Curraghmore Estate.
‘Beatrix’, published by the Bantry-based Somerville Press, was the brainchild of Maria Ines Dawnay, widow of the late Major Hugh Dawnay (Whitfield, Butlerstown, 1932-2012), who was a grandson of Beatrix’s.
Speaking at the book’s launch in Curraghmore House, just feet from Philip de László’s portrait of Beatrix which adorns the book’s front cover, Mrs Dawnay’s pride in the finely produced end product was both deserved and palpable.
“This is a love letter to Beatrix,” she told the packed reception room. “My mother-in-law (Lady Katharine Dawnay) adored Beatrix and I had promised her that nobody would forget her mother. My mother-in-law passed on Beatrix’s memoirs to me and she was always keen to see them published. Curraghmore was her home and this was a place that she really loved, cared and wrote about – and I hope that readers will enjoy it.”
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“In the Visitors’ Book for the New Year there is a picture of a large beetle and thereby hangs a tale. Among the ‘Xmas Surprises’ I had bought some most life-like India rubber beetles and, in order to cheer up Mr Humble, we put one of these in his napkin at dinner, not knowing that he had the utmost horror or such insects. When it dropped out, he leapt up and refused to be comforted till we removed the beast, but during this time another was put into his soup and, being ‘Cockie Leekie’ that night, the beetle and the prunes were almost indistinguishable, so that we only just prevented him to such an extent that we could hardly get him to sit down again and he was much too frightened of beetles to touch the thing, so never discovered it wasn’t real.” (Early 1908)
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At the launch, Thomas McCarthy, the acclaimed Cappoquin-born poet and novelist, provided guests with a colourful oversight regarding the book’s chief protagonist.
“This is a book that you must read from beginning to end,” he said, overlooking his attentive audience from halfway up the reception room’s staircase.
“There's something very special about Beatrix; it’s something to do with the quality of the person, something to do with the society, her description of society - particularly the society of East Waterford and South Tipperary, which is just fantastic. Even if this (book) was only a historic document of locals, it would be an invaluable book.”
Mr McCarthy added: “All the great names of Waterford – the Dawnays, the Beresfords, the de la Poers – all these names which feature so prominently in Curraghmore and Waterford’s history – they’re all here in this book.”
In an observation which anyone who has read the book in recent weeks will testify to, Thomas McCarthy noted: “Within the first 25 pages, you’ll feel you’re reading a Barbara Cartland novel because she (Beatrix) writes so well. She beautifully describes those early months when she first encountered her Lord Waterford, her Marquis. Both of them had something very profound in common: they both danced beautifully.”
An early passage in the book, written by Beatrix in 1897, months before her marriage to Henry, vividly captures the ecstatic and occasionally overwhelming experiences of one’s first love.
“Next day I was in Rotten Row (Hyde Park, London) at the appointed time, although it was miserably cold and wet morning, but there was no sign of my friend! Up and down I went, getting more and more dejected, and rode along the other ring, past the Barracks, several times, in the hopes that he might see me. He often chaffed me about this afterwards and declared that I went up and down before the window the whole time, in the most brazen way! At last, after three quarters of an hour in the wet I was thinking of going home, when he appeared smiling and not a bit penitent, and pretended to be awfully surprised to see me. The (horse) ride ended very happily, except for having to say goodbye.”
The “delicacy” of her husband’s health “is one of the tropes that runs through all of these diaries,” according to Thomas McCarthy. “She worries about him. He had a constant susceptibility to influenza which was an extremely dangerous disease in adults and children before antibiotics. He had gone game hunting in Africa and he had come back, as she says, thin as a lathe; there wasn’t any weight on him at all. His face was yellow – he developed a serious fever and that recurred throughout his young adult life.”
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“Getting back to Curraghmore was, as usual, a great joy…Outside, the clearings had been gone on with and the Shellhouse garden – which was a very dreary and untidy spot – had been entirely cleared in the centre, the whole of the turf re-laid and then all replanted with Azaleas, and many choice shrubs; when we came home the Munich fountain was put up there. T loved this little garden, which was his first venture in shrub gardening, Everybody used to be taken to see it and he was immensely proud of it. He did not care much for flowers, except the wild bluebells which he loved, but was very keen about flowering shrubs, bamboos and trees with good foliage. Red was his favourite colour and, though there was not much of it in the Shellhouse garden, nearly all the rhododendrons he planted later were red and he always said we couldn’t have too much of it here.” (April 1903)
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Thomas McCarthy described ‘Beatrix’ as “essentially, the diary of a young woman. If you think of Taylor Swift, the author of this book was around the age (Swift) is now, writing in her 20s and early 30s so it’s full of liveliness, full of dance. In fact, the book begins at a dance and an encounter between (Henry and Beatrix); he danced three times with her and she realised what a good dancer he was and how comfortable she was with his arms around her”.
Married life was relatively and sadly short as Lord Waterford died in December 1911, aged only 37. An inquest ruled that the Marquis had died by drowning, an outcome which an Evening Standard report of the time stated: “threw little light on the mystery surrounding his decease”.
In a note dated October 16th, 1912, on the anniversary of her marriage to Henry, Beatrix wrote: “Now there is no-one with whom to talk over those bygone years, and memories stored away soon grow dim. So I am going to write down all I can remember of our life together during those 14 years, and as I have always kept a very short diary, the task should be a fairly easy one. It will be a labour of love, for every word will bring back something of him and some day it may help the children to remember him, and give them some ideas of our married life.”
The most important element of this book, in Thomas McCarthy’s view, is how it emphasises the Irish element of what it meant to be Anglo-Irish in the years building to social upheaval, the War of Independence and the Civil War.
“Most of us, the ordinary Irish, if you like, would have seen the life of aristocracy, the life of the Anglo-Irish ascendancy, as not really the life of Ireland, (of) not being connected with Ireland…
“In fact, one of the most commending and wonderful things about this book is it tells you what an attachment the Anglo-Irish families had to the places where they were born and where they were raised. They had an incredible loyalty to their own localities, whether it was Portlaw, or Lismore, or Cappoquin, they had a distinct local pride, which sounds like a GAA pride in their locality. And that comes across in this book so beautifully. And her love of the physical beauty of Ireland is also described – and her descriptions are terrific.”
Seven years after the death of Henry Beresford, Beatrix was wed for a second time, marrying Osborne Beauclerk, who later became the 12th Duke of St Albans. They lived at Newtown Anner, just outside Clonmel. Beatrix, a daughter of the 5th Marquis of Lansdowne, died in 1953, aged 76.
The publication of her memoirs, a long-held wish of her daughter Katharine, has welcomingly come to pass, to the benefit of all who hold a curiosity and love for not only Curraghmore but Waterford city and county in turn.
“The most beautiful place in the world” is how Beatrix describes the estate she would later come to call home.
Those of us with lengthy connections to Curraghmore would heartily agree with such a sentiment, contained in the early pages of a book which Thomas McCarthy “admonished” those assembled to buy during his compelling and insightful lecture.
Many thanks to Lord and Lady Waterford for their kind invitation to the launch
‘Beatrix: Dowager Marchioness of Waterford – Memoirs 1895-1908’ (€20) is published by Somerville Press https://somervillepress.company.site/
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